Brisbane home owners staying put

We often hear stats on the number of home sales and for a couple of years now the volumes have been low. The other way of looking at this is to consider that Brisbane property owners are hanging onto their homes, and investments, for longer. Analysts RP Data have just confirmed this.

Brisbane houses are now owned for an average of 7.9 years, up from 6.3 years from 2005. The report looked at properties actually sold in the year to August, so like all stats you need to consider how the sample’s created. Lots of owners are hanging in there and not selling at all – so the averages will probably get longer.

So over 5 years we’ve had a rise in holding time of 25% and you have to wonder whether all those property owners are happy staying put. The reasons we all move – downsizing, upsizing, the consistent “hatches, matches and dispatches” of life – are all pressures to change home. Maybe we’re all waiting for that next boom…

Fortunately for us hungry real estate agents (minimal sympathy expected!) unit owners are a bit more regular at selling, with an average tenure of 6.2 years. That too is up from 5.2 in 2005.

So amongst all the tea-reading, tarot-carding and crystal-ball-gazing of analysts, economists and suburban real estate agents, we’ll make one prediction for the new year. In 2011 Brisbane home owners will move more often. Not much but a bit more, as job security and (relatively) low interest rates support the desire for that fresh place. Achieving a higher price than the neighbour will become less of an obsession and the volume of sales will sneak up.

And if this proves to just be wishful thinking and we’re wrong then a move to Darwin’s looking good. Their home owners sell up every 4.8 years!